“Production for sale in a market in which the object is to realize the maximum profit is the essential feature of a capitalist world-economy. In such a system production is constantly expanded as long as further production is profitable, and men constantly innovate new ways of producing things that will expand the profit margin.” MenWorldWayLongRealizingEconomyObjectsEssentialsCapitalismProfitProductionsFeaturesCapitalistNew WaysMaximumProfitableMarginsWorld EconomyProfit Margin Book:The Capitalist World-Economy Source: The Capitalist World-Economy
“What distinguishes the historical social system we are calling historical capitalism is that in this historical system capital came to be used (invested) in a very special way. It came to be used with the primary objective or intent of self-expansion. In this system, past accumulations were 'capital' only to the extend they were used to accumulate more of the same.” WaySelfPastUsedSocialSpecialCallingCapitalismHistoricalObjectivesPrimariesExpansionAccumulationSocial Systems Author:Immanuel Wallerstein
“To be sure, the use of force by one party in a market transaction in order to improve his price was no invention of capitalism. Unequal exchange is an ancient practice. What was remarkable about capitalism as a historical system was the way in which this unequal exchange could be hidden; indeed, hidden so well that it is only after five hundred years of the operation of this mechanism that even the avowed opponents of the system have begun to unveil it systematically.” WayYearsWellsUseOrderForcePartyPracticeFiveHundredCapitalismHistoricalAncientInventionOperationsOpponentsRemarkableMechanismTransactionsUse Of Force Author:Immanuel Wallerstein
“The way in which these two practices contain each other is that it has always been possible to use the one against the other: to use racism-sexism to prevent universalism from moving too far in the direction of egalitarianism; to use universalism to prevent racism-sexism from moving too far in the direction of a caste system that would inhibit the work force mobility so necessary for the capitalist accumulation process.” WayTwoUseMovingForceProcessPracticeRacismCapitalismSexismCapitalistAccumulationCastesMobilityEgalitarianismCaste SystemUniversalism Author:Immanuel Wallerstein
“One by one, these governments came undone, and were forced into IMF tutelage (and national illegitimacy) by the careening oil prices, the debt imbroglio, and falling terms of trade. The last of these governments to fall were the Communist regimes of eastern Europe, which have now gone the way of other Third World countries. The second in the cascade of bifurcations is thus symbolized by 1989.” WorldWayCountryGovernmentLastsFallTermGoneCapitalismEuropeThirdsTradeDebtOilCommunistRegimesEasternUndoneThird WorldEastern EuropeThird World CountriesCascadeImfOil PriceTutelageBifurcation Author:Immanuel Wallerstein
